Stefania Testa

• Phd Management Engineering
• Professor (Associate) at University of Genoa

Electronics waste (e-waste) is the fastest growing category of hazardous solid waste in the world. While the generation of e-waste has recently attracted the attention of a number of researchers, currently, there is little awareness on its management, monitoring and control among the consumers of crowdfunding platforms. This is surprising because t...

Purpose This paper aims at explaining variances in the contribution of Islamic crowdfunding platforms (ICFPs) to sustainable development (SD), by adopting an institutional logic perspective (ILP). ICFPs represent a dual institutional overlap between two logics (the Western-mainstream and the Islamic logic) which have an impact on corporate social r...

The agri-food system features prominently in discussions about sustainable development because of its broad economic, social, and environmental impacts. To examine how the agri-food system is responding – and can respond – to the grand challenges of sustainability, we position this Special Issue (SI) within the stream of sustainability-oriented inn...

This article explores the relationship between corporate social responsibility (CSR) and innovation, focusing on medium-sized enterprises and adopting a stakeholder-based view. Using a platform launched by the Italian government, which provides information about CSR efforts and innovation performances at the firm level, the authors distinguish, by...

Extant literature has investigated the effects of new ventures’ environmental sustainability orientation (ESO) on the crowdfunding (CF) performance and on the ability to secure venture capital, separately and with mixed results. In this article, we address the study of these relationships simultaneously. Specifically, we examine how the presence of...

A common goal of current research seems to uncover whether crowdfunding (CF) could be considered an effective way to support sustainability‐oriented initiatives in securing funding, due to diverging results emerging from literature. We claim that the objective of proving whether CF may benefit sustainability‐oriented initiatives could be misplaced;...

Literature investigating social media-based innovation has grown considerably in the last years, making a timely review. Accordingly, we systematically review studies of the so-called “latency phase” (2003-2013) outlining a framework based on two main actors – innovation seeker and innovation provider – and three main questions – why (determinants)...

Crowdfunding presents many opportunities for moving towards a sustainable society, with specific interest for sustainable entrepreneurs and innovators. In order to examine the potential role of crowdfunding in this context, we position this Special Issue (SI) within the larger stream of sustainability transitions literature, and in particular in re...

Background: The capability of agro-food firms to innovate positively influences their profits and growth. Accordingly, the literature has tried to comprehend innovation phenomena occurring within the agri-food industry which generates high levels of economic output and employment in the European Union. Nonetheless, innovation in the food industry i...

The aim of this paper is to suggest a framework for studying firm innovation processes in a social process perspective that integrates the micro, meso and macro levels of analysis, that is, the knowledge creation of individuals/communities, the knowledge coordination of organisations, and the spatial–institutional contextualisation of knowledge. Fo...

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate how an adequate mix of technological, organisational and managerial tools might support Open Innovation (OI) processes achieved by contests in the food sector. Design/methodology/approach The methodology of this paper is exploratory in nature. Data have been gathered about the 140 innovation co...

The concept of collaborative networks has attracted considerable attention, especially in two knowledge domains: innovation and operation management. Although collaborative networks have evolved into many forms, their central role in triggering debates has not gone unnoticed. In this paper, we aim to contribute to these debates through a bibliometr...

Based on an overview of 90 contests in the food sector this paper aims at reaching a better understanding of the many drivers pushing companies to launch contests, and thus suggesting a possible classification of the contest types. The emerged contests types are the following: entertainment (pure entertainment; surveying; talent scouting) and ideat...

The aims of this article are (1) to critically review the theoretical arguments and contribution of the knowledge base approach to economic geography and innovation studies, and the value added and limitations of applying it in empirical studies as reported about in the extant literatures; (2) to propose a new interpretation of the knowledge base a...

This article uses a bundle of bibliometric and text-mining techniques to provide a systematic assessment of the intellectual core of the Social Media-based innovation research field. The goal of this study is to identify main research areas, understand the current state of development and suggest potential future directions by analysing co-citation...

The concept of collaborative networks has attracted considerable attention, especially in two knowledge domains: innovation and operation management. Although collaborative networks have evolved into many forms, their central role in triggering debates has not gone unnoticed. In this paper, we aim to contribute to these debates through a bibliometr...

The concept of collaborative networks has attracted considerable attention, especially in two knowledge domains: innovation and operation management. Although collaborative networks have evolved into many forms, their central role in triggering debates has not gone unnoticed. In this paper, we aim to contribute to these debates through a bibliometr...

The aim of this article is to explore the relationship between human actors and technology in the context of a social media platform, developed by a leading Italian firm in the food industry. In order to address these issues, we adopt a theoretical approach that is deeply rooted in Pickering’s “mangle” theory, and Jones’ subsequent metaphor of “dou...

This paper aims to understand why some Entrepreneurship Education (EE) initiatives in secondary schools are ineffective. Specifically, the goal of this paper is to identify mistakes, which could have been responsible for the failures and to derive some useful lessons from them. From a theoretical perspective, it reviews entrepreneurship literature...

This paper has three aims. Firstly, to provide a critical review of previous conceptualizations of the knowledge base approach in the research fields of innovation studies and economic geography. Secondly, to propose a broadened interpretation of the knowledge base approach which allows for considering combinatorial knowledge bases within and acros...

This article seeks to enhance understanding of the link between knowledge resources and internationalization patterns of small and medium-size enterprises in the food sector. Knowledge resources are described using the concepts of knowledge intensity and knowledge bases. The study is exploratory and is based on 6 Italian case studies. Four research...

This article investigates a social media-enabled customer co-creation project at the front-end of innovation (FEI) in a well-known, large-scale food manufacturer. It sheds light on the role of social media technology in transforming the characteristics of FEI in terms of boundaries and knowledge distance. What type of exploratory or exploitative in...

The aim of this article was to explore the relationship between human actors and technology in the context of a social media platform, developed by a leading Italian firm in the food industry, and created to keep in contact with its customers, while gathering innovative ideas from them. In order to address these issues, we adopt a theoretical appro...

Purpose This paper aims to study the role of ideology in brand strategy with reference to large‐scale food retailing. By means of a thorough case study investigation of highly ideology‐focused food retailer Eataly, the paper aims to enrich existing theory on retailer branding. The various elements of Eataly's brand have been studied in order to ide...

This article investigates a customer co‐creation project at the front end of the innovation process at a large well‐known Italian food manufacturer, which is enabled by social media. The purpose is to shed light on the role of such technology in transforming the characteristics of the FEI, in terms of boundaries and knowledge distance: what type of...

This paper aims to understand why some Entrepreneurship Education (EE) initiatives in secondary schools are ineffective. Specifically, the goal of this paper is to identify mistakes, which could have been responsible for the failures and to derive some useful lessons from them. From a theoretical perspective, it reviews entrepreneurship literature...

Purpose – This study aims to develop a categorization framework for knowledge management systems in small and medium enterprises (SMEs). Framework dimensions have been identified as company knowledge domain (organization, marketing and technology) and company innovation behaviour (high and low). Design/methodology/approach – The framework is deriv...

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to contribute to a better understanding of internationalization patterns among speciality food small to medium‐sized enterprises (SMEs), investigating dimensions that may have a bearing on such patterns, using a series of case studies. In particular the investigation seeks to gain new insights about differences...

The present work aims at analyzing how a food retailer may succeed in turbulent times by trying to overcome the weaknesses of the two dominant paradigms in food retailing (conventional and specialty) through business model innovation. In order to conceptualize the business model, the dimensions suggested by Morris et al. (2005) are adopted. Case st...

This paper aims to contribute to research on the knowledge dimension of industrial innovation and competitive advantage by combining two conceptual constructs that are applied in growing but separate bodies of research. One, the so-called “SAS model”, regards knowledge bases of firms and distinguishes between Synthetic, Analytical and Symbolic know...

This paper focuses on the process of establishing an entrepreneurial course with a bottom-up approach, i.e., under the leadership of an entrepreneur. Such initiatives are rather uncommon given that most resources are deployed in top-down approaches that emphasise institutional actors. The paper's objectives are as follows: • to discuss the evolutio...

In the last decades, the cluster approach to innovation has become very influential among policymakers. Clusters are recognized as the primary locus of social capital (SC) and civic engagement and are thus able to foster company innovativeness. This chapter investigates the effectiveness of top-down cluster policies in creating new SC and the abili...

This paper takes a knowledge-based view of firms and discusses the importance of linking organizational knowledge assets into corporate strategy. In order to conceptualize knowledge assets, the paper adopts the intellectual capital (IC) framework, which distinguishes three IC components: human, structural and relational capital. As regards business...

This paper compares the findings of a research project aimed at investigating different perspectives on innovation issues to some of the latest, most relevant topics related to small and medium enterprise (SME) innovation under investigation in the European Commission (EC). According to recently published EC documents on the relaunched and revised...

Summary This paper uses a comparative case study approach to investigate how two small Italian food producers manage their knowledge. The first company under consideration is mainly focused on marketing, while the second on the technology knowledge domain. This paper enriches the existing literature by documenting examples of how companies can succ...

This paper covers important, not fully explored research topics; namely a broad concept of innovation including not only technology but also social and cultural aspects. It focuses on the processes of innovation in the Italian food industry, namely what kind of innovation Small and Medium Sized Enterprises (SMEs) can afford in a traditional, mature...

The present research stems from the results of a survey on the innovativeness of a sample of Italian Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs). These results, largely based on self-reported data by entrepreneurs or managers, showed that the considered SMEs were important developers of radical innovations in contrast with data published by local instituti...

This paper investigates the ability of local food producers to exploit the elements of regional Intellectual Capital (IC) embedded in local food systems in order to gain a competitive advantage. This paper analyses how an appropriate use of regional IC, combined with organisational IC, can increase firms' competitive advantage. The focus is on the...

The purpose of the research is to articulate a framework for analysing the effects of e‐procurement adoption in terms of knowledge management. Starting from this position, a case study in a leader firm in electronics devices was developed and a consolidated knowledge perspective was adopted. Empirical evidence confirms that it is not information an...

Knowledge Management (KM) has become a central theme in today's business environment and a commonly cited source of competitive advantage. In today's global economy, many economic activities in and among firms are based on the contribution of workers that are geographically dispersed and have loose contractual links with the company. Building on ev...

The aim of this chapter is to analyse and to define the role and opportunities offered by the adoption of a new ICT (Information and Communication Technology) tool within an organization, focusing attention on internal collaborative processes that have been induced by the development and use of the new tool. As noted by some authors, ICT tools may...

This paper focuses on the effectiveness of Knowledge Management Systems (KMS) in settings characterised by different task uncertainty. Drawing on Perrow's model of technology and structure, four case studies have been developed. User satisfaction is introduced as a proxy for KMS effectiveness and then as a test of the theoretical propositions devel...

Traditionally, data warehouses (DW) have been counted among the most powerful problem-solving tools to enable easy access to information and enhance the effectiveness of decision-making processes.Nevertheless, as noted by some authors, the outcome of any Information and Communication Technology (ICT) tool is emergent, since there will always be sco...

Traditionally, benchmarking has been described as a practice that promotes imitation. However, according to a more recent approach, this paper suggests that benchmarking, looking outside the firm boundaries and enabling comparison with others, in terms of both practices and performances, enable the process of acquiring external explicit and tacit k...

Traditionally the data warehouse (DW) has been treated in purely technical terms based on the hypothesis that the investment in technology would necessarily bring about predetermined solutions. The observation of empirical cases seems to contradict this point of view by placing the role of people and the emergent use of technology in first place. T...

Knowledge Management (KM) has become a central theme in today's business environment and a commonly cited source of competitive advantage. This paper argues that one of the main drivers of knowledge-related organizational problems is the dispersed nature of organizational knowledge. In today's global economy, much of economic activity in and betwee...